kickfoxing:

okay i’m still thinking about this post so just like… imagine:

• jean gets to USC and he’s in pretty bad shape
  
• (physically and emotionally)
• and we all know jean is an absolute asshole, he’s a dick!
• it’s just how he is
• (we don’t love him any less just like we don’t love kevin any less)
• jean’s dealing with both the terrible things that happened to him as well as the terrible things he did in the nest
• neither are something that will go away easily
• so he get’s to USC and is greeted by the absolute ray of sunshine that is jeremy knox
• but you know what?
• fuck jeremy knox!
• all jeremy is to jean in that moment is a lifeline, a way out of the ravens
• but jean’s problem with jeremy isn’t with jeremy
• it’s with kevin
• kevin who hung onto jeremy for so long as a beacon of hope
• kevin, who’s excitement about jeremy is inherently linked in jean’s mind
• so even captain sunshine can’t shine into jean’s dark soul 
• (at least at first)
• becuase sunshine doesn’t go well with rain
• only thunder and lightning do
• and laila and alvarez no better than most the type of shit you can go through
• they both understand what it’s like to have a hardened exterior that slowly makes it way inside of you
• it’s laila that first cracks jean’s shell
• while he’s busy being a grade A dick, she’s busy undermining everything he says
• “the ravens aren’t the only champions around here, moreau”
• “oh really, well what team has more court members?”
  
• “this team is a family, not a machine”
  
• each time, she cuts jean to his core without pushing him too far
• jeremy (bless him) tried, he really did
• but laila is the one who challenges first
• she’s the one who battles him on the court but asks him to dinner of the court
• she’s the one who will sit in silence in the library with him while they both get work done
• she’s the one who talks him into getting help when his memories are too much 
• and eventually, jean will thank her for all she’s done
• but in the moment, he doesn’t even realizes it’s happening